ColorEyes Display Pro 1.6 for Mac - Apple Monitor Updater

The Apple Monitor plugin allows Coloreyes to adjust the brightness of Apple monitors automatically based on your target luminance value. There are no color adjustments in Apple monitors so all this tool does is adjust brightness. It definitely makes profiling easier and faster on Apple monitors - No longer mess around with the brightness sliders!

This standalone updater is specifically for customers who have already purchased ColorEyes Pro 1.6 prior to May 9, 2012. and will only run on v1.6. You can download the update only and install over your existing 1.6 install here:

Download the Apple Auto Brightness Updater Go to web URL adress at end of release

If you have an older version of ColorEyes running on Lion unfortunately there is not an option to update the apple monitor plugin other than upgrading to v1.6

If you want to update your copy of ColorEyes Display to 1.6 you can buy the latest updated version in our store for $49. All new purchases include the updated apple monitor plugin.

The 1.6 update requires that you already own a serial number. www.integrated-color.com

GO TO NETFLIX FOR PHOTO LIGHTING DEMONSTRATIONS

When I was a kid in grade school I was able to go to Saturday movie matinees; and that was in the 1940’s. Living in a small city on the Canadian prairie during the Second World War there was nothing else available to me to see what the rest of the world was like. Those memories of matinee films stayed with me and I am sure influenced my work as a photographer some years later.

Being almost all black and white films the lighting of the subjects on-screen was a crucial part of the visual experience. And just by chance I recently became interested in films made before my time and found dozens from the 1930’s are available from NetFlix on DVD, a very affordable media for home entertainment. Even though the ’30’s was still early in motion picture history, the techniques and image quality is often as  fine as you will see in contemporary films. 

In the last couple of weeks I have seen about a dozen films from the 1930’s featuring stars that are still well known for what they accomplished on-screen. Some of the most outstanding include films with Marlene Dietrich directed by Josef von Sternberg beginning in the early 30’s and in 1934 with The Scarlet Empress a story of a young Prussian princess who was married to Peter III of Russia and soon learned the intricacies of Tsarist rule and took advantage to become Catherine II Empress of Russia. The large cast, ornate costuming and sets that replicate the Kremlin were an immense challenge to photograph and each scene is a lesson in masterful lighting as good as anything made today, and is easy to appreciate in black and white without the distraction of color. Plus now in America where women have yet to achieve full equality the story of Catherine II reminds us there have been great women everywhere throughout history.

The distinct style of Marlene Dietrich is unique to film history but there was a great variety of stars and films made also in France and America of course that are in NetFlix list of DVD’s. The American rage of Parisian entertainment, Josephine Baker best known for her dancing in nightclub revues was also a star of films like Zouzou directed by Marc Allegret which featured her superb acting abilities as well as a role as singer, and of course gorgeously exotic for those days. Films with Josephine Baker go back to 1927, although Zouzou was made in 1934.  

We are more likely to think of Cecil B DeMille in terms of big American films about history, but in 1935 The Last Days of Pompeii with Preston Foster and a large cast of Hollywood actors and actresses told the story of the period before and at the time of the eruption of Vesuvius. It is another black and white spectacle on screen with masterful lighting of a demanding and extravagant set and equally varied scenes in the picture. One of the great advantages of these old films now on DVD, you can easily stop the film at any frame and capture a still, so you can study the lighting more acutely. With some setups that still can be saved and you will be surprised how well it will reproduce as a B&W print.

Could a photographer ask for anything more at the low cost of renting a NetFlix classic movie that’s full of lighting lessons that apply just as well as any current instruction for lighting even with digital photography?

APRIL SHOWERS

LUMIER PHOTO’S NEW SCAN SERVICE

Many photographers who have been making pictures for a long time have a collection of images still on film. The advent of digital photography has taught us there are many advantages in having these images in digital format, for preservation to avoid fading colors in films, as well as easier more compact and economic storage among many other conveniences. But unlike me some of you do not find scanning and editing digital images the pleasure I do. But affordable scan services that are all done in America have not been readily available, and having your photos sent to a third world country for scanning is just too scary at any price, or maybe politically offensive.

Now one of the better names in digital photography, Lumier Photo, has announced a new modest cost film and print scanning service that is all done in Rochester, NY. The service they are offering is done by skilled technicians, and your original image remains safe and secure here in the USA.

Both prints scans and film image scans can be saved in either JPEG or TIFF format. The print scan resolution is selectable between 300dpi and 600dpi using a flatbed scanner. And film in 35mm , super 35mm , 126 format as well as 110 slides, even half-frame 35mm slide are scanned at either 4000, 2400 or 2000dpi for storage on CD or DVD discs.

Scan prices start at $.70 or $.80 for prints and $.75 for a slide. Service can be extended to include repair of image damage, as well as restoration via digital editing and processing after the image is scanned. 

Anyone interested in image scan services can contact Lumier Photo at 100 College Avenue, Rochester, NY 14607, or call 585-461-4447; or visit their web site at www.lumierphoto.com

                                                                                                 -0-

NEW COLOREYES DISPLAY PRO VERSION 1.6 FOR APPLE MAC

Since LCD displays for computers have become popular ColorEyes Display Pro has helped many photographers with display color management support that has both advanced capabilities and is effective and easy to use software. Now with the announcement of Version 1.6 for the Apple Mac ColorEyes capabilities and support for sensor hardware has been extended to the X-Rite i1 Display Pro, the original X-Rite ColorMunki, the new Spyder4 including multiple monitor support, as well as DDC support for NEC PA series displays, Wacom Cintiq tablets and some Dell displays.

Although the Mac Lion 10.7 monitor plugin has not arrived for ColorEyes from Apple, that upgrade will be covered in this Version 1.6 as a free update in the future. Support for all the previous colorimeters and spectrophotometers in the previous version of ColorEyes will remain. The extent of the added support in this new upgrade requires an upgrade fee of $49, as well as a serial number from a current version of ColorEyes.

Additional information about this new Version 1.6 and ColorEyes is available on their web site at:

www.integrated-color.com, or call 978-670-1416

Integrated-Color Corp. PO Box 738, Barrington, NH 03825

TWO DIFFERENT WORLDS

One of the bad jokes of April was that a Java enabled malware had attacked millions of Apple Mac users. It’s not unpredictable considering Apple since the introduction of the iPhone and iPad has become one of the most popular and active technology companies in the world. So of course it will attract the disaffected and discontent who will launch attacks on Apple systems. Sadly I am afraid the protection we had from Apple being a niche player in a much larger world is gone and disappeared in the bright light of popular high tech toys.

Today MacWorld published an analysis of how Apple has responded to the attack. Since the infection was noticed Apple has sent Mac users three new Java upgrades. The latest apparently contains a “tool to remove the flashback malware from infected systems”. I can’t say if this will be continued by Apple vigilance and equally effective and timely responses in the future. But in the personal computer world in the past user were pretty much on their own and had to spend money and effort to protect their computers from the risk of attackers infecting and damaging personal computer resources.

It seems maybe a bit paternalistic on Apple’s part. But personally I would like having expert eyes behind me that will step in with upgrades and fixes to make using a computer and the internet less risky. It is inhumanely technical and almost alien to those of us who are not part of corporate consumerism, so it is welcome that Apple identifies so readily with its customers the people who have become a part of the community. I felt this somewhat over a decade ago when I moved from the PC world to Apple, and even though I had problems that were addressed in a way that supported my loyalty, I was not fully convinced being a part of the press and known to be outspoken. Was Apple just helping me because I have a voice and might write critically of them?  But this very different public role Apple has taken in defense of users to protect them from external attacks and the subterfuge of hackers, has put Apple on the side of people, its customers. The Apple stores, now in ever more communities is a symbol unlike their competitors they do not hide from the people who depend on them.

This recent flashback malware is the first significant general attack on Mac users and Apple with its latest Java upgrade assumes responsibility in its protection strategy. So let’s hope the enemy takes a lesson from the Apple response and unlike others Apple will not put its customers out on their own in the position of dealing with security and at the mercy of dubious outside companies that make a profit from the fears of people who are at risk, encouraging the attackers to do even more damage. 

CONFUSING: TOO MANY CHOICES

Some choices are an advantage. You can select a digital camera from many that suit your needs and are within your budget, and likely get good quality image results. Almost as many choices are available for computer applications that support editing and processing digital camera image files for both Windows PC’s and Apple Macs, and they will get the job done effectively for most users. But when it comes to how to manage, and adjust a computer display screen for photography using an application like Adobe Elements or Lightroom and how to do it, the internet is full of imagined options and short on reliable facts.

If you run a Google search on a workspace profile name like Adobe RGB (1998), which is a pretty well known term now because advanced digital cameras can be set to save in Adobe RGB, you might expect an understandable explanation in an Acrobat .PDF document published by Adobe. I doubt you will get past the first couple of pages before giving up. If you don’t have an understanding of advanced physics the formulae are a mystery that explains nothing to most ordinary photographers, might as well open a text on trigonometry for entertainment.

But then if you get into some of the internet forum discussions about color management and display calibration and profiling, you might find questions from many users whether they should set their display to Adobe RGB (1998). The simple answer is no, and the reason is Adobe RGB (1998) is a workspace profile for Photoshop and many other Adobe applications to use internally, it’s not a display profile. But in an hour of reading I only found this information by chance, deep into a lot of extraneous discussions.

Some of the readers who are aware of color management as it applies to displays, ask what color temperature (white point) to use, and what gamma setting, realizing there are a lot of options. But are there really, even though some users employ various different settings? Today these are false and misleading choices for most photographers using a computer. Present computer systems like Windows and Apple have conformed to one standard gamma of 2.2 and a color temperature of D65 or 6500K. So lets just look at these basic settings as they are applied to todays LCD displays for computers. 

Even though some computer users still select the old Apple standard of D50 or 5000K, and gamma 1.8 they have their reasons, maybe that the display color temperature should match the color of the working environment. Many have installed D50 work area lighting. So I have to ask if D65 on a display looks too blue in D50 environment light, maybe it would be less costly and difficult today to replace the environment lighting, in the old days there weren’t any options, but today there are. But I am afraid people are inclined to hang onto what they are used to and resist change.

However technology changes, and one standard that applies to LCD displays now is that the backlight for the screen is 6500K. So if a user wants 5000K or D50 instead that shift has to be made in most cases by the resources in the computer’s video card. (Eizo Coloredge displays excepted, as are NEC Spectraview models.) Maybe that capability for the rest should be kept free for more important functions. Personally I changed the room lighting in my lab to LED lamps that last a very long time and use little electricity while producing an even amount of light of a color temperature that closely matches my LCD display’s backlight. It was easy to do and the price was a very small fraction of what an LCD display costs.

The other specification some insist they have to modify is gamma. The standard 2.2 some argue does not reveal enough detail in dark areas of subjects. Well there is an option in most display management software aim points, and that is to raise the black luminance to a slightly higher value than minimum. That will then be a part of your display profile and set the reproduction of the darkest black in an image a bit higher on the physical range of values the display reproduces. This will make what is in shadow more easily seen on screen.

Yes I am arguing for conformity to standards, a bit regimental for some Americans comfort likely. But there are good reasons. One is that many photographers will use an Adobe or another application from Corel or Lasersoft SilverFast that are color managed. And adobe, the most popular, in its Color Setting asks you to select a working-space profile for RGB editing like Adobe RGB (1998) or sRGB, which are used by many of us. Working space profiles impose their built-in settings on the display of images on screen. On launching the application whether Elements or CS5 Photoshop, the application references the default display profile so it can adjust images to the working space profile’s dictates, and in the case of sRGB and Adobe RGB the gamma is 2.2 and the color temperature (whitepoint) is 6500K. So If you have chosen a different white point and gamma it is essential that you select a working space profile that coincides with your gamma and white point choices if you want to work with Adobe applications and have your images accurately reproduced.

With Apple Macs their applications like iPhoto and Aperture work in display space, and if you save a TIFF file the display profile will be embedded in the file. This doesn’t help anyone else who receives the TIFF file because it is unlikely they can duplicate your display and its profile. So with Apple you have the ability with the Colorsync utility to convert the image to Adobe RGB (1998) and then it will be the image’s embedded profile. In other words color management is designed by Adobe’s implementation, and Apple’s to share image files with others computers, and they can reference the embedded profile and display the image as you saw it with your system to the extent hardware differences allow.

There are good and broad beneficial reasons to adopt standards, besides making life a bit easier on yourself,

LIGHTROOM 4.1: DOES IT HAVE A FIX FOR PRINTS TOO DARK?

That is what Scott Kelby has suggested. What is it? An adjustment in the print output module of Lightroom 4.1 that supports luminance adjustment or “matching”. From what I have read from users in web forums it can obtain a corrected print brightness if the image file otherwise produces a color-managed print that is too dark.

Some may think this new tool corrects the problem. But no, it may compensate for the dark print but the cause of prints too dark remains because the LCD display hardware is still too bright. This causes the user to miss-edit the brightness of the file with his software. And even if the user has calibrated and profiled the display, dark prints are only part of the error that results. If the luminance range of the display caused poor imaging editing adjustment with software, calibrating and profiling a too bright display will also produce a display profile that is skewed and will not result in either seeing accurate color reproduction on-screen but also skewed color in resulting prints even if the brightness is adjusted with Lightroom to an acceptable level.

One of the more frequent commentators on color management, the Digital Dog (Andrew Rodney) posted a concluding comment on the discussion of the luminance matching adjustment in Lightroom 4.1, “Title: Re: Luminance matching: Soft Proof vs. Print Adjustment sliders - Post by: digitaldog on April 05, 2012, 08:58:55 AM

Quote from: jeremyrh on Today at 02:44:18 AM

One could argue that using the brightness slider is no more a "hack" than turning down the brightness of the screen  ;D

I could argue it easily (want to go there?). 

A print is either too dark or it isn’t. Got nothing to do with the screen. A print might match the screen, might not. Different story. One slider affects the output (and only in a single application while leaving the RGB values alone). The other slider affects the display and leaves all files in all applications alone and consistently. So yup, I think the sliders that affect a document that is too dark, solely for a print, in a single application is a hack. People can use it (they can use a preset or adjustment layer in say Photoshop). As long as they understand the causes and effect of the problem, fine with me. Now if you want a print that isn’t too dark and you want it to match the display, the hack isn’t going to help one bit.”

One might ask why, even though Lightroom 4.1 is in public beta, would the company, Adobe, include a fix for “prints too dark” that avoids the basic hardware cause that LCD displays are too bright? Is it because user printing has been adversely affected by photographers just giving up because of frustration with poor printing results? Has the photographer discouragement reduced Lightroom software sales recently? And if the application has a print output luminance fix correcting for dark prints, maybe it will encourage more users to upgrade to Lightroom 4? I really wonder because this fix that does not correct for the LCD display hardware cause, surely could come back on everyone with a sharp sting. The fix has a high price even if it works to obtain better brightness print output, but at what cost to color and image quality?

I don’t have any answer other than to use an LCD display that will adjust to photographic color management requirements. Although there is not a lot to choose from and most pro-graphic displays are costly, a software work-around seems to just delay the inevitable. But in the five years the prints too dark problem has plagued many, many photographers, I have not seen any industry support to encourage people to avoid the cause and use good color-management solutions. For many of us prints too dark is not a problem, and it doesn’t need to be for anyone serious about doing digital photography. 

UPDATE: HISTORY MAY NOT BE PROGRESSIVE

David B. Brooks - March 2012

In recent questions and answers in Shutterbug Digital Help there has been a concentration of interest in LCD displays, color management and printing reproduction problems. For me it began to show up about five years ago when there was an eruption of complaints listed from numerous sources on Google about “my prints are too dark”. I began to investigate what the dark prints problem was and what might be causing the problem. In the beginning there was no apparent and clear picture, it was complicated with few common elements. Some were blaming color management directly or indirectly, but that was obviously not an answer although color management was affected by the problem. The reason was that color management and the use of profiles does not involve the lightness or darkness of print output. That is entirely a function of the brightness and contrast adjustment stored in the image file that is being printed. It was not a printer or print driver problem because there were no commonalities, all printers and drivers were involved in the problem and these same printers and drivers were also used without a print too dark issue.

This concentration of interest is due to what the display and computer industry offers and what the digital camera industry develops and promotes, as well as a practice of denial by many major players in the industry, including Adobe, Intel, Microsoft and Apple, just to name a few. They do not admit that there is a problem of “prints too dark” even though early in its development Google had millions of hits on the subject posted on their web site.

Why there is a problem is because the color management system (ICC) was designed when only CRT monitors were used with computers, and incidentally the average brightness (white luminance) at about 90.0 CD/m2, if the monitor was adjusted to 6500K color temperature. The coincidence is that 80.0 to 90.0 CD/m2 is a match to paper white. So a correlation between a screen image with a color managed system and a color print output came about naturally some years ago.

The prints too dark problem arose as CRT monitors were displaced by newer LCD displays, which are generally much brighter with a higher white luminance compared to CRT monitors. Without adjustment of the white luminance, photographic images edited and adjusted using an LCD display that’s too bright and recorded by the image file. So when printed by a color managed workflow the prints were correspondingly dark. That may seem counter-intuitive, but it is not considering the process. If the image was edited and adjusted on a display brighter than paper, when it is sent to a printer driver the RGB positive is inverted to a CMYK image that tells the printer how much ink to put on the paper. But if the image file assumes the paper is brighter than reality, too much ink is applied to normal brightness paper.

This problem becomes even more complicated by how camera companies function in what they provide photographers. For snap-shooters using point-and-shoot  cameras a JPEG/sRGB file is adjusted in brightness by the camera’s processor assuming the real, true brightness of paper, so if the file goes directly to a print service the printing machine applies the correct amount of ink for the brightness of the image. If the photographer has a typical home/office computer with an LCD display and opens the image to edit it with an application like Adobe Elements, Lightroom or Photoshop; they are all color managed applications which adjust the Adobe working space to match the display profile. If the computer is not display color-managed then the Adobe applications matches to the generic profile installed by the computer/display. If the display has been adjusted, calibrated and profiled at a bright luminance setting, the color-managed display is for a color set that is greater than paper, so it will be skewed. In either case color matching becomes dubious; but as long as the working space is sRGB and the image from the camera is sRGB, color divergence may not be very apparent. But if the Adobe working space is set for printing (Adobe RGB 1998), then both the color range and brightness are off, plus an sRGB display will only reproduces 2/3rds of the color in Adobe RGB.

A similar situation exists if a photographer uses a dSLR camera and saves in Raw format. Then even if Adobe RGB workspace for printing is selected, if the LCD display has only an sRGB color range, ⅓ of the possible colors in the image will not be reproduced on-screen. And if the screen is not adjusted to the equivalent of 80.0 or 90.0 CD/m2 white luminance, profiling of the display may be skewed in addition to the image being edited for a greater brightness than printing on paper matches.

Many in the industry understand that standard home/office computer displays involve a multitude of contrary catch 22, problems relative to their use for digital photography. So if that were admitted would photographers buy these computers and image editing applications and adjust their photographs perceptually on-screen? Maybe not, some wouldn’t. Some would just use JPEG/sRGB save and send their images unedited to a print service. But many photographers want to fix errors in photographs, crop them, and combine them together, or whatever “magic” is offered by application sold to them. Some would also like to print their own images for Christmas cards or birthday greetings, so many things people like to do like sharing images with relatives and friends.

But when a photographer buys a home/office computer most may not be aware that there is nothing in the computer that has any data as to what the color content as seen in the display is and what the colors are according to any standard. There is a general conformity that the red, green and blue data in image files is reproduced as such by computers. And that is why display management software and hardware, a colorimeter sensor to measure the display are offered. These display management devices do two things: 1. Calibrate the display and provide a data file adjusting video output so it conforms to the ICC (International Color Consortium) standard RGB colors. The calibration file goes into the computer’s boot-up folder and is started when the computer is turned on. 2. The display is measured exactly as it reproduces a pattern of standard ICC colors and records variations from the standard in a text file called a profile. This file is placed in the operating system color profile folder, and is activated as the display’s default profile. This profile is referenced by color managed applications like Adobe, Elements, Lightroom and Photoshop and is used to adjust the video output to conform to the working space profile selected, like Adobe RGB (1998) or sRGB. Although some of the newest display management software has automatic display control, many home/office displays do not have supporting DDC (Digital Display Control) that will allow ADC activation and display adjustment. So many LCD displays, even if color managed, may not be adjusted for the white luminance that matches paper white, it’s not easily done manually with good success.

Most home/office LCD displays are very bright compared to CRT monitors from the past, with maximum white luminance as high as 400.0 CD/m2. If this brightness is lowered to 80.0 or 90.0 CD/m2 white luminance, if it can be decreased that much, very often the color reproduction is adversely affected and distorted.

For photographers who use dSLR cameras and save images in Raw format there are only a very few pro graphics LCD displays that both reproduce nearly all of the Adobe RGB (1998) color gamut range, and will adjust to 80.0 or 90.0 CD/m2 white luminance and reproduce highly accurate color, they are:

1. The Dell Ultraharp U2410 24 inch 1920x1200 pixel LCD display.

2. The LaCie 324i 24 inch 1920x1200 pixel LCD display.

3. The Eizo Nanao Coloredge and both Flexscan S and SX display models in all sizes.

4. The NEC Spectraview model displays in all sizes necessarily including the Spectraview software and a supported colorimeter.

Current display management systems include: X-Rite i1 Display Pro, Data Color 

Spyder4 Elite, and the ColorEyes Display Pro software and a supported colorimeter. 

Some photographers may be lucky and avoid problems like “prints too dark”. Others may just give up and loose interest. The rest we have heard from, often completely confused by every difference of opinion there is on all of the photo web sites. If the display is color managed with calibration and profiling at a brightness with a greater white luminance than 80.0 or 90.0 CD/m2, then the profile does not match the colors that should be reproduced in a print. In other words a bright LCD display that is calibrated and profiled will not reproduce color-managed print output in either print density or color that matches the image displayed on-screen.

However, I am not alone on this issue. Good answers are available from dozens of color management shops around the country, from both NEC Spectraview and Eizo Nanao display dealers located in most major cities, from the professional departments of some large camera stores and pro labs, as well as in the accredited schools of professional photography; not to mention the many individual photographers I have become acquainted with. I seem alone on this in the press largely because enthusiast photographers do not frequent expensive professional services, and Best Buy has no solutions, just standard home/office computers. 

This is not just a problem for serious photographers, it is an opportunity. Many serious amateur photographers want to understand and get the best results available to them. In the last five years since “my prints are too dark” made me do some frantic searching and investigation the digital photography and personal computer markets have changed. With cameras there are ever more varied choices, but selecting a computer that will support digital photographic editing and processing is a not even a fair crap shoot. Most home/office computers will handle JPEG/sRGB snapshots and sharing images with friends and family in many different ways, by e-mail, in slide-shows, or on a public web site. But doing any serious image editing although possible opens up complications. For instance, although Adobe and other software vendors do not tell you; Elements, Lightroom and Photoshop are color managed applications; and that really demands calibrating and profiling your display. If you don’t you also do not get an accurate image of your photo on-screen according to any color standard and if sent in an e-mail the picture may not look like what you saw on-screen when it arrives on another computer.

If you buy an advanced dSLR camera and want to reproduce the best image qualities it offers, a companion computer must be even more capable and specialized than most off-the-shelf store models are.  If you want to use the Raw digital camera format, then most of the displays on home/office computers available today will only reproduces 2/3rds of the color variations captured by the camera. If you want to make prints that duplicate the image you see on-screen, the LCD display has to be adjusted to a brightness that matches that of paper-white in printing paper. This along with a color range that reproduces Adobe RGB in Raw camera files is only available with a very few professional grade LCD displays.

Digital cameras and computer have little in common. But the basic rationale and practical considerations that apply to choosing a camera also apply to choosing a computer to do digital photography processing and editing. First you determine what kind of photography you want to do. Then you select how you want to use the resulting images. Then you select a camera and accessories that will accomplish that within your budget. The more advanced and sophisticated you want to get with photography the more you need to acquire a sophisticated camera type, make and model to select and buy, usually at a high cost. These same considerations apply to a computer you may want to use to do your digital photography processing and editing – the two technologies need to parallel each other to accomplish success with both.